Listening to "Cadillac, Cadillac," the opening cut on the new Train album, it sounds almost as though vocalist Pat Monahan was practicing to do Sting songs at the local karaoke bar. Interesting and weird. After that, though, the CD, titled "Picasso at the Wheel," shifts back into the streamlined, post-millennial pop direction the band's been steadily gravitating towards.

Essentially, this is an expertly polished, assembly-line batch of choruses that are immediately catchy — even as they suffer from the sort of homogenization that sweeps modern rock like a plague. At times, one cut or another on "Picasso" could be mistaken for Imagine Dragons, Foster the People, Justin Timberlake or The Fray.

Speaking of The Fray, the Colorado poppists are opening for Train on a tour that brings both bands to the Mohegan Sun Arena for a performance Sunday. Matt Nathanson's also on the bill. Expect the mid-tempo hookery to ooze through seats of the hall like syrup across pancakes.

— Rick Koster

Train, 7 p.m. Sunday, Mohegan Sun Arena; $55 and $75; 1-888-664-3426.